Tenzin Nyidon
DHARAMSHALA, Nov. 24: Dorje Tashi, one of Tibet’s most prominent businessmen serving a life sentence in Lhasa’s Drapchi Prison, has been violently assaulted and left with serious injuries, his lawyer Wang Fei revealed on October 29.
According to Wang, Tashi was attacked by three inmates, leaving a deep scar on his forehead. Prison officials reportedly violated regulations by failing to notify his family of the incident. It has also emerged that Tashi was previously beaten by eight inmates on April 17, 2021.
Once among Tibet’s most prominent entrepreneurs, Dorje Tashi, founder of the Yak Hotel and several successful businesses in Lhasa, was arrested following the 2008 Tibetan uprising. He was accused of “illegal business operations,” tortured in detention, and in June 2010, sentenced to life imprisonment by the Lhasa Municipality Intermediate People’s Court after a three-day secret trial. Details of the proceedings remain undisclosed. His case has been widely denounced as politically motivated, targeting his financial support for Tibetan monasteries and humanitarian causes.
Tashi’s elder brother, Dorjee Tsetan, was also imprisoned for six years. Despite repeated appeals by family members and lawyers, Chinese authorities have consistently refused to review the verdict or grant visitation rights.
Over the past decade, Gonpo Kyi has led multiple hunger strikes and peaceful protests outside courts and government offices in Lhasa to demand justice for her brother. She has been detained, beaten, and subjected to intimidation on numerous occasions, yet has continued to advocate for his release.
In the days leading up to her protest in August, Kyi staged several peaceful demonstrations in front of government offices in Lhasa. On August 18, she was reportedly dragged through the streets by plainclothes officers and beaten, sustaining injuries to her leg. She was then confined to a guesthouse under heavy surveillance and assaulted repeatedly before jumping from the second floor on August 20 in desperation.
Human rights organizations and Tibet advocacy groups have strongly condemned the Chinese authorities’ handling of both cases. Tibet Watch, which has followed Dorje Tashi’s case closely, has described his imprisonment as emblematic of “the lack of legal protection and systemic political interference in Tibet.” The group highlighted that Tashi’s conviction was based on coerced confessions and flawed evidence, including a loan that had already been repaid, no complaint from the issuing bank, and valid ownership of collateral, and called his life sentence “grossly disproportionate and politically driven.”
